The Sandwich Generation -
Two young daughters,my parents,
two dogs, and a job working with older adults...I am living a sandwich life between the young and old! Evidently that wasn't enough, so I have added 9 chickens too! Update! 15 chickens!

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Truly my LAST garage sale, I hope!

Texas is known for their especially hot summers.

June started out hot and my garden and the vegetables gave up very quickly.

Instead of getting any better, July is usually worse, many years setting higher records than the year before! Somehow this July has had its moments though and when we woke up Saturday morning, it was actually raining.

Yippee! No garage sale! It is raining!

That's what I thought and I turned over and went back to sleep.

Only my darling niece Gillian is so much like her mother that it is just plain scary and once I had said garage sale, her genes kicked in and there was no talking her out of that garage sale. My sister Jana had garage sales often. When she was trying to make it on her own with her 2 girls, she was willing to sell anything to ensure they had everything they needed. At one sale she fell before it even started and ended up with a sprained ankle and still insisted on doing it. Thankfully Marcie and Drew talked her into going to the ER and I did her sale, but she was willing to get a cane, a crutch, or even a chair and keep selling! Gillian is so much like her!

We had spent the evening before pricing everything, which is not the way I usually do it, but all 4 girls needed something to do and Gillian and Annabel were amazingly accurate on what I thought the price should be on most things. Only they got a little carried away and some things I did not mean to sell ended up in the sale!

We got a late start, since I tried desperately to talk them out of it, but we all worked together to get things out of the house as quickly as we could and immediately people started stopping. Our goal was to raise enough money to do a fun activity this summer together and hopefully put a little spending money in their pockets too. But with the rain, I really did not expect to make $20.

Marcie soon joined us with some of her "treasures" and the time passed quickly.

Gillian was the born negotiator standing firm on prices as needed, but compromising on others. She helped count up how much someone owed and suggested additional items.for them to buy.

Annabel was pretty much the carnival barker and if I had given her a flag, would have been waving down traffic to get them to stop and look.

Grace was in charge of the money and chose to sit on the porch as far removed from the confusion as possible.

Darcey was there as back up and ready to bag things up for the big sales.

I truly hate doing a garage sale and each time I avow, affirm, aver, all of those that I will NEVER do another one, but this had to be the least worst one and it was all because of us working together and making it fun. We also stopped before it got too tiring but ended up with enough that each girl got $25, which Gillian spent that afternoon, and enough for us to do an activity together.